Saturday, July 02, 2005

OK, finally posting an ad in the series with some cool toy I can ramble on about before calling it a night!

This particular toy is something I wanted, but never got... I thought it was cool, but now, as an adult, I realize that it wasn't quite as cool as I thought it was. Well, that, plus I've seen the actual toy, and it had limited play potential.

As I recall, the only joints were in the shoulders... no others! And it was basically using similar technology as was used with the Rom action figure... batteries in the torso, one hand could have accessories placed in them (like the flashlight), while the other had a line that could be drawn out and attached to something, and activate the figure, and it would wind it back in.

Never saw the Green Goblin figure, or the Spider-Copter that this would also work with.

Here's an ad that was all too common in the comics of the 70s... and probably the 60s, as well!

I remember seeing these as a kid and being completely enthralled by them... my frame of reference for what they were selling was probably green plastic army men, and I figured this stuff was all the same size. Yep, I had no interest in the games at all, just in the figures!

What I never did find out was what exactly you got with these games... were the figures plastic? Or were they cardboard "counter" figures, like with most of the earliest tactical strategy games of the 70s and 80s? If they were plastic, were they very, very tiny?

Inquring minds want to know... As an adult, my suspicion is that the ads were fairly misleading, like the "Monster Size Monsters" and "Remote Control Ghost" and so on.

The Wonder Woman utility belt, however, ain't one of 'em! Well, okay, it's not exactly something marketed towards males... and it does appear to have what one would need to play at being Wonder Woman (save for the swimsuit and boots... and the suit could be subbed for Wonder Woman Underoos, at least... )

Going down from there are superhero drinking glasses! Now, I know there were some glass comics glasses that were promos at Burger King or someplace... but these are different from those, natch! I think I've seen these for sale at a few comics shows, but don't own any of 'em.

Continuing downward are the Sky Heroes! I know I've seen a full-page ad for these, and they're kind of bizarre... they're glider airplanes with different superheroes printed on them, so when you throw 'em, it looks like the hero is flying.

The most bizarre thing about it was the characters they chose for this! Superman? Okay, good call, he does fly. But the others? Batman, Captain America, and Spider-Man. Do any of them fly? Noooooooo! Wouldn't it have made more sense for them to market, say, Wonder Woman (whose flight power back then was referred to as gliding), or the Human Torch, or any other flying character?

Next column, back at the top, it's the Comic Action Batmobile! This was Mego's second Batmobile... the first was made for their 8" Batman and Robin figures, and I used to have one of those... but I had one of these, too! You see, towards the end of Mego's time in the sun, they had these figures called Comic Action Heroes, and they were kind of cool and kind of bizarre. Kenner was making great headway with their Star Wars line, which could be sold cheaper than the Mego 8" figures could be sold for, thanks to the rising cost of plastics. So Mego, in an attempt to regain their market (which, you know, was their fault, for passing on the Star Wars license, purportedly because they already had the Star Trek license, and figured one space show was enough), came out with the Comic Action Heroes, who were about the same height as the SW figures, but they were posed in this bizarre bent-knee, bent-arm pose, so they couldn't even stand upright! These figures had heads that turned from side to side, and arms jointed only at the shoulders, and legs that were jointed at the hips. I recall the lower torso of these were rubber, while the rest was plastic (unless the character had a cape, in which case the cape was rubber, too). There was also a variation which had the figures ramrod straight.

The "Comic Action" part of the name came about because of the accessories you could get, which usually came with a bladder and rubber hose... squeeze the bladder, and the forced air would cause a bridge to blow up, for example.

As cheap and shoddy as their 8" Batmobile was (and it was cheap and shoddy, let's be honest), the Comic Action version wasn't much better. The best Batmobile based on the comics was yet to come, IMHO, as part of the Super Powers line (and yes, I had one of those, too).

Below that is the Batman Stunt Cycle... there were two versions of these... one of them was like the old Kenner SSP cars, which had this "T-stick" that you fed next to the axle, and when you pulled it, it would get the wheel going (something kind of similar, but different, was used for the Evel Knievel toys from Ideal).

This version, however, was friction powered, which meant you'd rev it up on the floor and let it go!

Like most super-hero toys of the 1970s, these were most easily found at KMart, and I think I had one of these as a kid (I know I had the Batman parachuter, but that's another story).

On to the third column for the Batman Water Gun! Now, this is something I know I didn't ever have, and let's face it, it's kind of weird looking... like someone said, "Let's make a squirt gun shaped vaguely like the Batmobile!" Of course, the most bizarre superhero squirt guns were these toys that looked like Super-Deformed superheros with huge heads, and when you squeezed the trigger, the water came out of the figures' mouths!

Next up is the Batman Utility Belt, and this was probably the best Batman play toy they could've come up with, and it must've sold well -- I mean, look how many variations we've seen on it since the first Batman movie! Dunno why they put a gun in it, though.

And finally, the DC Super Placemats! Never had these, either... and they pop up at conventions fairly rarely. Like most character placemats of the era, these were simply printed on paper and laminated.

Here's another ad for Amazing World of DC Comics, this one touting their special Superman issue!

What I find most interesting, however, is the other heroes presented here... all statted from various pieces, and nearly all from different artists! I guess DC didn't have someone available to draw up a nww piece for this ad, and the cover wasn't ready yet?

Ah, a new Heroes World ad for you to drool over, and this one features the 12" Megos, to boot!

I love Megos... I loved 'em when they originally came out, and as an adult, when I had some disposable income, I started collecting 'em again. I'd amassed a pretty amazing collection at one point, which included all the Teen Titans, almost all the Marvel figures and DC figures, a good number of the Planet of the Apes and Monsters lines, too! I even had a few Comic Action Heroes. At that time, I also had Secret Wars and Super Powers figures in my collection.

Where are these figures today? All sold off, sadly... every one of 'em. The good news is that I sold them for anywhere from 2 to 3 or more times what I'd paid for them. The bad news is, it'll probably cost me 3 or 4 times that to replace them if I ever think about doing so (which means waiting to win the lottery, I'm sure).

Remind me to tell you guys a Mego-related story about a store called Toy Liquidators sometime...

Another possibly mislabeled file here... but anyway... this was probably one of the most bizarre things advertised featuring comics characters... maybe you guys have seen things like this featuring other characters... it's kind of a metal frame with these plastic beads filling in the spaces and baked, so the beads melt and they get all shiny and stuff.

OK, Jessi went to bed early tonight, and it's been a while since I posted much other than comics ads, so time to do some catching up!

Work has been busy lately... although not so busy that I'm getting much overtime, which kind of sucks... next week being a short week because of the Monday holiday, I'll be putting in extra hours probably every day next week, but because I won't be working over 40 hours (God willing), it won't pay time and a half... unless I come in on the weekend to do some work... sheesh!

I know I haven't done the mini-reviews of the last comics I bought, and to be honest, I've completely lost track of what I'd bought... it's been mixed in with the last few months' purchases! So I guess I'll start fresh with next week's purchases.

I'm feeling a bit frustrated with my eBay auctions lately... It's annoying to see a number of people watching an auction, but no bids! In fact, most of the bids I receive tend to be in the last 2 days of an auction! I think that perhaps, if I relist anything that doesn't sell, I'll change the duration from 7 days to 2 days, just to get it over with sooner.

Anyway, the most annoying thing about people watching an auction is when it closes with one bid. There was a Pepe Le Pew poster up that closed last Sunday with one bid... but four people were watching it! Bizarre.

As I've alluded to before, Jessi and I are going on a short vacation later this month, to Seaside, OR. We'll be there from about the 18th to the 21st or so... whatever the Monday through Thursday of that week is, leaving Monday morning and coming back Thursday evening. Since neither of us have a laptop, I'd imagine I won't be posting at all during that time... but to make up for it, I'll plan on posting so much the day before that it'll take lots of time to read through it all! What that content will be, I have no idea... yet. I do have a few ideas...

For starters, there could be a bunch of comics ads from the 60s and 70s... but of course, I've been doing those anyway, so that could hardly be considered "special," now, could it?

Another thing I may do is -- assuming the files still exist somewhere on my computer -- is post some of the interview I did with Tony Isabella many moons ago. Some of that interview was printed in the Halloween issue of Comic Book Artist, and some of it's appeared in Tony's Online Tips here and there. So, if I find that, I may post it, or at least some of it.

Another thing I'm considering is posting the first few chapters of "Doc" Kent: The Man of Steel, a prose Elseworlds story that basically recasts Superman as Doc Savage. I started writing that well over a year ago, but hadn't done anything in quite some time... so I may post what I have written, and see if it gets me motivated to writing more.

I'm sure I'll have other ideas in the next few weeks, too... and I may do one post that's nothing but links to pages that I hit regularly or semi-regularly, that may be of interest to you guys!

Tuesday, June 28, 2005

Here's the last of the January '74 ads... for the Ready Rangers toys! These ads appeared in a number of comics, and as a kid, they really appealed to me. I think it was about this time that I was in my brief time in the Scouts.

This is obviously the kind of toy that wouldn't even appeal to kids these days, eh?

Kenner Toys managed to have quite a few ads in the comics of the 1970s, and probably in the 60s as well. Most of us probably recall their ads for the Super Powers toys of the 1980s more...

Anyway, I digress. I never had this particular toy when I was a kid (what can I say, never had much interest in sports, to be honest). I'm guessing this was some kind of spinoff of their Give-A-Show Projectors, which always appeared to be mini-movie projecors, but are just really slide projectors, with slide sets similar to what you see here.

So... anyone reading this get this toy as a kid? Did it actually work?

Here's a house ad for a pair of 100-Page Super-Spectaculars, which were some of my favorite comics when I was a kid in the 70s... thanks to them, I was introduced to so many different comics characters, from the Golden Age and the Silver Age alike... but especially the Golden Age!

Unfortunately, these seem to be some of the priciest books of the 1970s at comics shows...

Howard Rogofsky... there's a name to conjure memories with, eh? He used to have ads all over the comics, it seems... and I have some vague memory that there was some kind of major scandal involved concerning him.

However, a brief web search reveals nothing of the sort, so it could mean I'm completely misremembering.

Anyway, Howard was probably the first guy to do mail order comics sales, and as such, deserves a spot in comics fandom history!

I hope you'll forgive me for this exercise in silliness, but sometimes things accumulate in my brain, and I have to let 'em out! Here's some random thoughts about comics-related matters...

Magneto and other magnetic-powered characters in comics must cause the credit card companies in their respective universes no end of trouble... I mean, just the everyday use of their powers must be wiping out the magnetic strip on dozens, if not hundreds of credit cards, bank cards, atm cards, and so on, every single day! And let's not forget how many video and audio tapes must get accidentally erased just because Magneto decided to launch an attack on the X-Men near the mall... Sunburst stores in the Marvel Universe must've gone to all-DVD long ago, eh?

Do you think Reed Richard had to invent a special electric razor for his own use? I mean, everything stretches, so I'd imagine unless his razor was configured just right, his whiskers would just be stretched along! I'm thinking he must have some kind of special adamantium blades in his razors.

Did superheroes in the Golden Age of comics just have a problem replacing their costumes when they were damaged? Looking over old comics covers, I'm struck at how often some characters costumes changed... sometimes from one issue to the next... and either they have several different costumes, or they just can't exactly duplicate their costume every single time they need a replacement.

Just why did Wayne Boring always draw Superman when he was flying to just look like he's walking through the air, a la Herbie Popnecker?

In the Silver Age, I think all of DC's Superman artists preferred Lana over Lois. Why do I say this? Because almost uniformly, every time I've read an old comic with the two of them, Lana is always drawn sexier than Lois is!

In Marvel's New York City, do you think that apartments and condos with a view of Avengers Mansion and the Baxter Building say so in their ads when they're available? Does this make the price higher or lower?

How many comics readers, when reading the Super-Sons stories in World's Finest, thought that somehow, Superman and Batman had secret marriages going on to produce said Super-Sons, and were just jerking around their women in their separate titles? How many thought they were "possible future" stories, like the Batman II and Robin II stories? How many read their first one and just said, "This is just plain silly," and never read another one again?

Sunday, June 26, 2005

OK, I apologize in advance, but I'm doing some plugging of eBay auctions again! This limited edition print of James Bama's cover for "The Mystic Mullah" is one of the Doc Savage prints I've just started to auction on eBay. Also being offered are the Alex Ross Avengers print mentioned here before, some mini Godzilla keychains, the final relists of some comics and other posters, plus a bunch of Beatles posters!

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About This Geek

I have been a Navy journalist, word processor, graphic designer, medical assisting student, cook, and truck driver, and am currently an eBay seller as well as an employee at a big retail store. I have been and always will be into comics, sf, tv, cartoons, monsters, oldies rock, and lots of other stuff.
If your blog has a link to this blog, let me know and I'll add you to my linklist!
You can contact me at waffyjon@comcast.net